Sunday Brunch: my favorite: tofu "eggs"

This is the last Sunday Brunch of Vegan Mofo! So I'm posting a couple brunch-y dishes I haven't had a chance to write about individually: tofu "egg" dishes.

Back when I was vegetarian, my favorite brunch/breakfasty foods were egg-based dishes: scrambled eggs, fried eggs, omelettes, French toast, etc. So as you may have noticed, our Sunday Brunches tend to be veganizations of eggy things. Tofu, in my opinion, does a good a job of mimicking the texture and ease of all the above dishes, and with a bit of black salt (a sulphur-tasting salt used in some Indian cuisine) to top it off, the flavor is essentially the same as well.

Tofu eggs florentine, made with fried tofu. It's only sort of "florentine," since I used spring greens instead of spinach.

Tofu eggs benedict, only Kevin's famous tofu bacon is on the side instead of on the "eggs." And a side of Japanese (white) sweet potato hash browns.

And, of course, scrambled tofu. It's not exactly easier than frying tofu to resemble fried eggs, but it's still really easy, and just strikes me as being a heartier breakfast.

 

 With sweet potatoes, the natural (or at least, ubiquitous, in our house) accompaniment to tofu "egg" brunch dishes.

Sunday brunch: gluten-free high-protein pancakes

I can't take any credit for this idea, only for the meal above. My mother is gluten intolerant, and her go-to gluten-free flour of choice is chickpea flour, which has worked for almost every recipe she's tried to de-glutenize... including the Vegan with a Vengeance/Vegan Brunch Perfect Pancakes, which here are made with all chickpea flour. You make the exact same recipe (which is readily available by googling it if you don't have the cookbooks, but you should have at least one of those cookbooks!), but swap out chickpea for wheat flour, one for one. For help binding, you also have to add a flaxmeal "egg" (one Tbsp flax meal mixed with 3 Tbsp water). The texture is the same, and the taste is only a little nuttier. My parents most often make blueberry pancakes with this, and you really can't tell at all that they're gluten-free.

anniversary beignets

One year ago today, I married the love of my life!

You can check the archives for information about our wedding (I wrote a few how-to type posts in January); I won't go on forever. But we had a wonderful wedding and have continued to have a wonderful first year of matrimony!

If you remember, we went to New Orleans for our honeymoon. I loved it there, and we found it very easy to be vegan. but walking past all the cafes that advertised fresh-cooked beignets--Café du Monde in particular, which is famous for its beignets-left me feeling a little sorry for myself. I knew I would love beignets: they are a cross between doughnuts and fried dough,  Almost as soon as we got home, I started looking for a recipe version to veganize. I am happy to present to you my findings: delicious vegan beignets, perfect to serve to your loved ones (or just to your face, that's totally acceptable as well).

Beignets are deep-fried sweet bread, so obviously they're a sometimes food in terms of health, but also because they are a bit labor-intensive. However, I assure you that they are ENTIRELY worth the effort. This recipe makes about two dozen, but you can easily double or triple it. They're best fresh, but if you don't get to them right away, store in an air tight container and heat in a toaster oven or oven just until warmed through, and they'll be just as tasty as when you first made them.

Vegan Beignets (adapted from Paula Deen's recipe)

1/2 Cup water
2.5 Tbsp sugar
3/4 tsp yeast
2 tsp flaxmeal
2 Tbsp water
1/4 tsp salt
1/3 Cup nondairy milk of your choice
2 1/3 Cups flour
1 1/3 Tbsp shortening at room temperature (I use Spectrum)
oil (for deep frying)
~1 Cup powdered sugar

Stir together the first three ingredients (water, yeast, sugar) and let sit for a little while (~5 minutes) to proof. (Ideally, that's the amount of time it takes to foam slightly.)

In a large bowl, mix together the flaxmeal, water, salt, and nondairy milk until everything's all well combined. Mix in the yeast mixture, then add half the flour and stir to make a wet dough. Add the shortening, and stir to make sure it's all mixed in before adding the rest of the flour.

Knead the dough for at least 5 minutes, until it is consistent throughout and you're tired of kneading. If it starts sticking to everything while kneading, sprinkle on a little flour to stop it. Shape it into a ball, then it put it in a lightly-oiled bowl. Cover with a paper towel, let rise for two hours or until doubled in size.

After it's doubled in size, heat up your oil for deep-frying! If you have a thermometer, you want to get the oil up to 350 degrees. If you don't have a thermometer, heat it up, then toss in tiny scraps of dough to test: you want it hot enough that dough pieces bubble like crazy right away. This is also a good time to line a cookie sheet with paper towels, because you're going to need it later and things move quickly from here.

Now, roll out your dough into a big circle, no more than half an inch thick. If you're like me and have lots of trouble with rolling pins, you can also just squish the dough into place. Use a knife to cut it into little squares, about a square inch and half. When your oil is hot enough, drop in the dough squares, piece by piece, until your pot is full but not overcrowded. You want enough room in there that they don't have to touch while cooking. They should start turning golden brown after only a minute or so; you want to flip them around every 10 seconds or so to get them evenly fried. Once they're a beautiful golden brown color, fish them out with a slotted spoon and plop them on your paper-towel-lined cookie sheet.

Repeat in batches as necessary until they're all done, then sift powdered sugar over top of all of them. Serve immediately, because they're so so so delicious warm, with a side of jam for people to dip them into or spoon onto them.

Enjoy the beignets! And here's to many more years of being happily married vegans ^_^

tofu in a hole

There's a classic American breakfast food that I never got to try, or even really knew about, before going vegan. Though it's commonly known as "Toad in a Hole," it is really different from the British version of Toad in the Hole. The British version is Yorkshire pudding with sausage. The American version is toast with a hole cut in the center into which you add an egg. I looked it up online and discovered that Toad in a Hole is also known as Egg in a Basket, Bird's Nest, One-eyed Jack, and Gas House Egg. Do you all know about this dish? Do you have a different name for it?

Anyway, this morning the husband wondered if I could try to make a vegan version. I've seen one recipe for a vegan version, but it takes a lot more time/advanced preparation than I had this morning... so I rose to the challenge to create my own. (You should still click that link, though, if not for that recipe than for the list of different names for Toad in a Hole. So cool!)

So, here's my version.

I fried up the tofu with my normal tofu "fried egg" method--I rub a couple pinches of black salt, asafoetida, and pepper on tofu, then saute it in oil till the edges start to get a bit golden. Making the circles left me with some tofu scraps, which I blended with water, arrowroot, a bit of nutritional yeast, and the same fried-eggy seasonings to make a binder that would stick the tofu to the bread.

I mixed a spoonful of the binder with turmeric to make the little yolks on top, but that's only for looks. The binder mixture is in the little green cup.

Then all I had to do was saute the bread:

Once I flipped the bread, I put a quarter of the blended mixture into each hole, then quickly added the tofu circles. A minute or two longer, and it was done!

The arrowroot mixture helps keep the tofu in the hole.

This breakfast was delicious, and I no longer feel like I'm missing out on an American breakfast tradition! So now I'll share it with you.

Tofu in a Hole
Serves 2, is easily doubled/tripled/quadrupled. Black salt is totally worth your time/money if you like an "eggy" flavor to things; it has a sulphur smell that becomes milder with cooking and really helps things taste like eggs. Asafoetida is a powder that smells half garlicky and half oniony, and also helps with egginess. You only use a REALLY TINY amount at a time. Both are available at any Indian grocery store, or online.

1/2 block tofu
4 pieces of bread
1 tsp arrowroot powder
3 Tbsp water
1 Tbsp nutritional yeast (optional, if not using, add a bit more arrowroot)
a few pinches of:
black pepper
black salt (optional, but IS the eggy flavor)
asafoetida (optional, but helps with eggy flavor)
turmeric (optional, only if you're doing a "yolk" look)
vegan margarine

Using a glass or small biscuit cutter, cut a hole in the center of each piece of bread. Use the same glass to press into your tofu to make circles that will fit in the bread. You can either cut the tofu into 4 slabs and then use the glass on them, or you can make one big tofu cylinder and cut that horizontally into 4 circles. It's up to you!

In a blender, combine the leftover corners of the tofu, the 1 tsp arrowroot powder (a scant 2 tsps if you don't use nutritional yeast), the water, nutritional yeast, a few pinches of black salt, and a tiny amount of asafoetida. Blend until smooth. This is your binder mixture. While it's blending, sprinkle a bit of black pepper, black salt, and asafoetida over the tofu slices, and rub into both sides.

Heat 1-2 tsps of margarine in a pan on the stove over medium. Saute the tofu circles for about 3 minutes, until the bottom is starting to turn golden. Flip, repeat. While the tofu is cooking, butter one side of each slice of bread.

(Optional, for the yolk [which is for looks only]: Before flipping, take a small spoonful of the binder mixture, and mix a sprinkle of turmeric into it. Put a small dollop in the center of each tofu slab, then flip and cook as directed above.)

Remove the tofu from the pan, add a little more margarine as necessary, then put the unbuttered side of the bread down in the pan. It should begin to brown in 3 or so minutes; check. Once the bottom has browned, flip it. Once you've flipped it, add a quarter of the binder mixture (should be a little more than a Tbsp) to the center of the hole in the bread, then press in a tofu circle (yolk side up, if you did a yolk) quickly. The binder mixture will come up around the edge of the tofu, that's good! Allow to cook until the bread is browned, again, like 3 minutes. You have Tofu in a Hole! Or Tofu in a Basket. Or Gas House Tofu. Whatever.

This parsnip mixture went really well with it:

It's parsnips and walnuts, sauteed with a bit of olive oil, salt and a splash of maple syrup. Yummmm.

Sunday Brunch: pancakes and crepes

My "blog photos" folder is going to be so empty after this month! Which is a good thing, since I tend to stockpile pictures for too long. Since there's only one day left after today, this is probably the last "epic post," and it's a delicious one.

Pancakes! I've gotten over my hatred of making pancakes; I'm much more patient now and don't burn them. Above, pancakes with blueberry sauce and cashew creme. Below, pancakes (I think they were lemon-flavored?) with a raspberry sauce.

And these are red, white, and blueberry pancakes!

Topped with soyatoo whipped topping.

This is the coconut pancake recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance topped with simmered peaches and hazelnuts.

You may have noticed a trend by now: I like to have fruit with pancakes. Unless they're SAVORY pancakes!

These were mirepoix pancakes (carrots, onion, celery) topped with gravy.

And finally, a sort of pancake: crepes!

These aren't filled with anything too exciting: fruit, cashew cream, and each one has a different seasoning. (I think I went cinnamon/blueberry, nutmeg/clove, and ginger/raspberry.)

So that concludes our "Sunday Brunches" this month. What are your favorite brunch foods that I didn't mention?

food from around the world (ie, internet)

I eat my lunch at my desk at work. Everyone does on my team, but even at my last job, when people would eat their lunches in the little kitchen area, I preferred to eat at my desk. When I eat my lunch, I take a little "break" by reading blogs; mostly food blogs, some design blogs. My lunchtime blog cruising has led to a stockpile or recipes I've built up; vegan ones I want to try, non-vegan ones I want to veganize, etc. Often the recipes I read about during lunch become the recipes I make for dinner.

As with the following recipes! All came from various food blogs, with the exception of the cabbage and the cheesecake, which came from recipe sites. But all came from my lunchtime internet cruising.

For the record, if you like the kinds of recipes I link to here, and if you like what's on my blog in general, you should check out my links page, which I update with my favorite blogs/websites more often than I update my blogroll to the right.
First, Okonomiyaki, large savory Japanese pancakes! Trina of Your Vegan Mom posted a recipe for okonomiyaki and some tasty sauce to put on them, and it looked so delicious (and I love Japanese food so much) I had to try it all.

Because Trina recommended okonomiyaki as a snack, I figured they might be too light for a meal, so I served them with miso soup and roasted squash. Turns out they aren’t too light; even just having one each along with the sides, the boyfriend and I were overstuffed when we finished. But in a good way.

For the record, this recipe is pretty darn foolproof. Not only did I cut my vegetables much larger than I was apparently supposed to, but I’m also one of those people who always burns the first pancake to a crisp when making breakfast—and look! My first attempt was a little brown but looked totally passable.

You can see Trina’s "inauthentic" but addicting sauce in the background. I had to put a cover on it because I was “taste testing” it entirely too much while making the okonomiyaki.

In a similar vein, a couple months ago, I tried the Korean version of okonomiyaki: Savory Tofu Pancakes from Alien’s Day Out. I had to add a couple tablespoons of water to the recipe to get the batter into a workable texture, but I may have just drained my tofu more thoroughly beforehand.

We had them with some seaweed salad and stir-fried rice noodles.

They packed up adorably for lunch the next day, too; they would make for perfect bento lunches.

For those more in favor of continental cuisine, I’ve also been crushing on the "Mastering the Art of French Cooking: the Vegan Version" blog, where Affectioknit is veganizing Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking recipe by recipe. She has some ingenious versions of some very not-vegan food. The boyfriend really likes her omelette recipe and has made it for me twice. The results are tasty. The first time he tried it, he overcooked the first omelette a little, so it’s browner than intended, but I’m posting the picture because it really gives you an idea of how eggy the finished version can look:

After the first omelette, he hit his stride. Here’s mine with fillings (note that I’d already started eating it. I have very little willpower):

Omelette filled with pesto and mixed veggies. Oh and in related non-egg news, I just bought some black salt! Normally when recipes call for it, I improvise by adding a touch of asafetida, which does lend a light sulphury (and therefore eggy) flavor to things, but I’m looking forward to trying the black salt.

What’s that to the left of my omelette, you ask? Why, it is a PANCAKE BAR.

Pancake bars are like granola bars, but made out of pancakes. I encountered the idea for pancake bars on the Kitchn website, where in turn they’d adapted it from a Martha Stewart recipe. I didn’t actually follow that recipe, but I did steal the idea. I made a double batch of “perfect pancakes” from Vegan with a Vengeance. I doubled because the recipe on that site calls for almost twice the amount of flour, so I figured I was making the amount of batter about even this way. I didn’t want to make apple ones, so I opted for cranberries; I added a cup of dried cranberries to the batter. You can't opt out of the streusel, though! If you want to eat these pancake bars on the go, or serve them at a large gathering, you can’t top them with maple syrup; this gives them a sweet topping without the mess. I ended up pouring my batter into a 9x13 baking pan AND into a loaf pan, because the total amount of vegan batter was a little more than the called-for non-vegan batter. Maybe that was still too much, as my baking time was also 10-15 minutes longer than the Kitchn website recommends. Anyway, for a single batch of VwaV pancakes, maybe try a 7x11 pan, or a 9x13 but shorten the baking time a little.

Not only are pancake bars novel and cool, but they’re also tasty and practical. I made them for a large brunch the boyfriend and I hosted, because I wanted to have pancakes but couldn’t serve normal ones because 1.) I hate standing over the stove forever making pancakes, 2.) I didn’t have time to do so with all of the other things I was busy making, and 3.) I didn’t want to have to worry about keeping pancakes warm on our buffet table. They were a giant hit.

Another interesting recipe I found on the Kitchn was for "butter dip biscuits." You know how it can be annoying to make biscuits because you have to cut in all the butter/fat? Not so with these; you melt the butter in your baking pan first, then make a butter-free dough, cut it into strips, and lay them in the butter. As they cook, they soak up the butter. It’s a very straightforward recipe to make and to veganize; substitute butter with earth balance or other vegan margarine, and the liquid milk with water or nondairy milk. They’re cute, and they taste pretty much like normal biscuits. The bottoms were a little too firm, but maybe I overcooked them a bit? The boyfriend called them "biscuit cookies" because he thought they were closer to cookie texture.

I served them as part of a tasty German meal; I made the Veganomicon beanballs with seasonings that were more German than Italian (onions, garlic, caraway seed), and included some sweet-and-sour red cabbage over pasta.

Not to be too dramatic, but I have had a lot of cabbage in my time, and guys, THIS WAS THE BEST CABBAGE RECIPE I HAVE EVER HAD. It’s incredibly simple; the recipe calls only for butter, cabbage, sugar, and balsamic vinegar (with salt and pepper to taste). but the flavors work beautifully together.

The last picture I have for you is of a recipe I made a while ago (I think last summer?), but it’s really relevant right now, since it would be a fantastic Valentine’s Day recipe:

Individual Raw Strawberry Cheesecakes from this recipe at the PPK. The recipe is for a whole cake, but you can divide it up into muffin cups. The components (cashews, coconut oil, strawberries [organic, guys! you should always stick with organic strawberries]) are a little expensive, but if ever there was a reason to splurge, this cheesecake is it. You can see I decided against the strawberry coulis, and no one missed it.

That brings me to the end of my cooking-around-the-internet post! I still owe you guys a "food from literature" post this month; I’ll do that early next week. I’ve read a book for it (Wide Sargasso Sea); now I’m deciding on the recipe. I was also thinking of posting a little house tour sometime this month, or at least a kitchen tour, so you can see where the vegetalion magic happens. What do you think?

weekend brunch: cinnamon rolls

The Cinnamon Rolls from Vegan Brunch are amazing. You will eat more of them than you suspect.

Though I have made a ridiculous number of recipes from Vegan Brunch, I held off on the cinnamon rolls for too long. See, I really think of them as a breakfasty food, and yeasted breads are not easy to have warm and fresh and out of the oven for breakfast, since they take so darn long. But! Letting the dough do its first rise overnight leads to fairly quick preparation in the morning.

Also, when recipes tell you to sift your powdered sugar, sift your powdered sugar. I didn't for the icing, and you can see the little clumps of sugar that remained. The clumps are tasty, but not as photogenic.

weekend brunch: tofu frittata

I love the frittata recipes (like this Shiitake Dill Frittata) in Vegan Brunch, especially because they give ideas for frittata "bases" that you can improvise off of.

For instance, I made Zucchini and Dill Frittata by swapping out the shiitakes with zucchini, but I've also made it with broccoli and no dill, or with cauliflower or chard (also from frittata recipes in the book). But one thing I don't like about the Vegan Brunch frittata recipes is that they recommend you use a glass pie plate to bake them! This "glass pie plate frittata" stuff doesn't fly with me. Frittatas get the BEST "crust" when made in a cast-iron skillet (as I did, above). You can see the nicely browned edges in my photo above; a pie plate wouldn't give you quite the same crispiness.

My cast-iron skillet is my best buddy in the kitchen, especially at brunch time. The ability to go from the stove top to the oven to the table is one of my favorite things about cast iron in general. I think that after my knife and chopping board, the cast-iron skillet gets the most use out of anything in the kitchen.

What about you? What's your favorite kitchen ware? What do you use for any and every recipe you can?

weekend brunch: "fronch" toast and the epic PPK Vegan Mofo survey

This morning I tried my hand at the "Fronch" Toast recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance. I'm a little surprised I hadn't tried a chickpea-flour batter, since I LOVE French toast, but I guess my go-to for French Toast is my own cashew mixture for the batter.

The chickpea flour mixture is great, though. Whereas cashew-based batter is thick and a little sweet, this was light and toasted up evenly. I only had a chickpea-fava bean flour mix on hand, but it worked fine. Maybe my bread was a lot more absorbent than Isa's, because it made enough for six delicious pieces, though the recipe says 12-15 (granted, that's probably from bread like baguettes).

I served them with a blueberry sauce and cinnamon-toasted pecans and kept me and the boyfriend full almost all day--which was good, because we then spent hours at the opening of the MFA's new Art of the Americas wing! It was awesome, and if any of you readers are Bostonians or visiting Boston, I recommend it.

Now! A bunch of us at the PPK compiled an EPIC PPK VEGAN MOFO SURVEY that we all said we'd fill out today. Here's mine!

What's your favorite spice or spice blend?
Black pepper. So handy. I go through phases sometimes, thyme having been the last one. Adobo powder is really convenient as a flavor enhancer for pretty much any recipe.

You have $20 to spend on fresh groceries and produce for the whole week (with a fairly well stocked pantry of dry goods, legumes, grains, and spices). what do you buy?
Spinach, tofu, onions, garlic. They're all so versatile; you can use them in almost every cuisine, in any (savory) dish. Plus they're super tasty.

What's your favorite way to make tofu?
I like to cut it into slabs and bake it in oil, some vinegar, and herbs. It gets a nice firm texture, and you can alter the herbs you use and add other things like soy sauce to make it fit whatever kind of meal you're having.

Vegan guilty pleasure?
Tings. I eat so many of those at a time.

If you could make anyone vegan, who would it be?
Paula Deen, maybe? Because she makes such decadent food, and it'd be cool to see what awesome Earth Balance-laden dishes she'd come up with. On a more serious note, all of the food writers who champion putting bacon in everything frm vodka to chocolte because it's so amazing and versatile and--ugh.

If you could only read one other vegan blog, what would it be?
Such a tough call! If she updated every day, probably Your Vegan Mom, since she has a pretty wide repertoire.

Were you always interested in cooking, or did veganism change the way you saw and interacted with food?
It's hard to say for sure, because I went vegan in college, just before I started cooking for myself, so my learning to cook happened at the same time as my becoming vegan. I did used to like baking in high school. Anyway, I've always been interested in food thanks to my amazing mother, who sees food as both physical and psychological nourishment, so I learned pretty early on to think about how food makes you feel, and the difference that good-quality ingredients make.

Excluding analogs, what new things have you tried that you probably wouldn't have as an omni?
Nutritional yeast. If you eat cheese, I don't think you ever really encounter nutritional yeast. Also, raw foods, probably.

What is the one vegan staple that everyone seems to love, but you can't get behind?
Processed vegan cheese. Daiya's okay in small doses, but all fake cheese is so salty, and I'd just rather not eat food that doesn't look like its ingredients. Also, vegan chicken broth. I tend to use unsalted bouillon when I use it at all, so to me the vegan chicken broth just tastes like icky brown salt water.

What was your first "wow, I'm such a stereotypical vegan" moment?
I don't know, I'm not sure I am a stereotypical vegan, or that I can actually imagine what the stereotypical vegan is/does.? I guess the fact that even at fancy events like weddings, I always have granola bars and/or fruit stashed in my purse.

First recipe you veganized?
I have no idea. Probably a baked good. Possibly Rava Laddu?

What would you like to veganize, but haven't yet?
Croissants! I used to love croissants so much. I'm going to try my hand at them sometime, though. I just have to have enough money to buy the multiple tubs of Earth Balance such an endeavor would require.

Favorite kitchen utensil/appliance?
I guess "a good sharp knife" is too obvious an answer, but mostly it's me and the kitchen knife, BFFs! The food processor, while dying a slow death, is also my faithful companion.

Most disastrous kitchen failure?
Waffles. Every time! I love waffles, and have a nice waffle maker that the boyfriend got me a while back, but something happens where I can't get them out of the waffle maker every time. And I know it's me, because the boyfriend has done it just fine with the same waffle maker. (Last time was a disaster for him, too, so maybe it's NOT just me?)

First vegan cookbook?
I'm pretty sure it was Robin Robertson's Vegan Planet.

What question about being vegan do you HATE answering?
"Where do you get your protein?" If you ask me this question, you are not showing your concern for my well-being. You are showing your ignorance regarding food and the human body.

If you could tell the world one thing about vegans, what would it be?
Most of us eat well, and most of us eat a lot. All of us aren't undernourished and gnawing on celery all day.

Funniest vegetable?
Any veggie with greens that I can shake around like maracas. I find this hilarious, even if the boyfriend thinks it's weird.

What is a family recipe you have veganized?
Some of my favorite recipes are ones passed down through my family! A very mayonnaisey pasta salad, my great-grandmother's blueberry pie, my mother's double-fudge brownies.

Weirdest food combination ?
I like all food (that I can eat); I guess I don't consider much weird. The boyfriend says it's weird that I cut dates open and stuff them with peanut butter. I'd say probably either daifuku or sweet seaweed snacks.

Is there something you wish you could veganize, but can't/couldn't?
I really want to make a cheesy soufflé some day, but I never had one before I was vegan, so I have no idea how one could ever veganize it.

Favorite ways to prepare tofu, seitan, tempeh, any other vegan proteins?
Well, other than baked tofu (like I said above), I like turning seitan into sausages, and I like breading and then frying tempeh like fried fish.

Are your pets vegan?
I live with the boyfriend's three cats and two geckos. None of them are vegan (except the boyfriend).

Favorite non-dairy milk?
I don't or rarely drink non-dairy milk, so it's mostly about how it behaves in cooking. I used to love Organic Valley's soymilk, but later found out that their vitamin D comes from lanolin, so now I go back and forth between hemp milk, which is pretty decent but is rarely organic, and almond milk which is also hard to get organic at our grocery store. I only ever buy unsweetened, unflavored non-dairy milk.

I hope you all had a great weekend!

weekend brunch: scrambled tofu

At our house, tofu is a weekend brunch staple. I like to saute slices in a bit of oil, vinegar, and spices to resemble a fried egg on a breakfast sandwich or tofu florentine or benedict. The boyfriend makes the world's best tofu bacon. But usually, on the weekends, we prefer our tofu scrambled.

Steamy scrambly goodness.

We almost always have scrambled tofu with a sweet-potato product and a bread product. Here is onion and olive scrambled tofu with sweet potato home fries and a biscuit.

I've tried a bunch of different recipes for scrambling tofu, but I've found the best kind is what we whip up ourselves with whatever we're feeling like at the moment. Here are the important components to scrambled tofu, which you can use as a simple scramble or as a base for a more exotic one: a block of firm tofu, crumbled (I like the occasional large curd-like crumble in mine, but that's mostly because my dad used to like to overcook scrambled eggs). A little oil. A bit of soy sauce, a bit of white miso and/or nutritional yeast (a tsp up to a Tbsp of each, whatever you like). And most importantly, if you want a good "eggy" texture: ground flaxseeds with some water. I'd've ever thought of that on my own (which is strange, actually, since flaxseeds are my go-to egg replacer), but the boyfriend always adds ground flaxseeds and water to his scrambled tofu.

I assume everyone has their own favorite recipe for scrambled tofu, so you might be thinking "whatever, I'm not trying a new recipe." But I'm telling you: try adding the flaxseeds. A good place to start is a Tbsp ground flaxseeds and 2-3 Tbsp water. Mix all your scramble ingredients in a bowl with salt and pepper, then saute in a skillet over medium-low heat (in oil if you want, but it's much yummier in a Tbsp or two of Earth Balance). Stir it occasionally, but it's nice if you can let the bottom brown a bit. You can eat it any time after 5-10 minutes. If you want to make it cook longer (ie, you're waiting for home fries to finish cooking), just add a couple Tbsp water so it doesn't dry out.

Some people, like my father, are scramble purists, and don't like any veggies in their breakfast, but I like to lightly saute some onion and/or garlic before I add the tofu to the skillet. Spinach or other greens are also good additions; shredded carrots can be good, too. Other things you can experiment with, to taste, when you go to make the tofu mixture are spices (turmeric for color, asafoetida or black salt for more of an eggy flavor, curry powder,  herbs), condiments (mustard, vegenaise, maybe ketchup if you're feeling crazy), seeds (sunflower seeds work well) or vegan analogs (fake cheese and/or cheese sauces, crumbled veggie bacon or sausage, etc).

weekend brunch: lemon walnut muffins

As you may recall from this post, the boyfriend is obsessed with weekend brunches, so while most of the week our breakfasts consist of toast and fruit, on weekend mornings (okay, or afternoons) we like to start the day with more substantial food. Each weekend of VeganMoFo, I'll post about some of the brunch foods we enjoy, starting today with lemon walnut muffins.

I am probably one of the biggest chocolate fiends you know. I don't necessarily have a lot of chocolate in one sitting (anymore), but I have chocolate probably every day. Not on purpose, even; it's not like I think "Hm, have I had chocolate today? No? What a shame, I shall remedy this situation with a single chocolate chip." There's no thought process. Instead it's more like "La la, just typing at my computer, hey, how did this chocolate get in my mouth? when did I even get up to get it? and where did I set the chocolate bar, because now I want more..."

So it will probably come as a surprise to you, as it does to my friends, my family, and even myself, that my favorite baked goods are ones that don't involve chocolate at all, but ones that involve citrus fruits. Don't get me wrong, I won't turn down a brownie in lieu of an orange, but if a baked good has that light irridescent yellow glow suggesting there's lemon zest in it, or that little sour hint of lime juice emanating from it, I will forget that I am a chocolate addict and devote myself to acquiring that citrusy goodness.

Lemon poppyseed muffins are one of my favorite baked goods, probably of all time. As you now know, I love lemon, I love poppyseeds, and I love being able to eat baked goods in the morning just because I can call them "muffins" instead of "cupcakes." But recently I had guests coming to visit who planned on going on a couple day trips with us, and I realized that if I wanted to offer them quick breakfasts-on-the-go and/or have a snack to grab during our wanderings, I needed something a little more substantial than poppyseeds in my muffins. I figured replacing them with nuts would be a good way to keep us fuller longer (since they have more protein and fat) while adding a little more in the way of nutrients. I was thinking of going for pecans, but the boyfriend asked for walnuts. Almonds could work, too, but would be much crunchier.

I will tell you right now, though I'm reproducing the recipe here, all I did was take the Lemon Poppyseed Muffins from Vegan Brunch, replace some of the flour with whole wheat pastry flour, and replace the poppyseeds with a cup of chopped nuts, so I wasn't especially inventive. They were delicious, though!

Lemon Walnut Muffins
Makes 12 muffins

2 C flour. (You can replace up to half of this with whole wheat pastry flour--I did 1/2 C)
2/3 C sugar
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 C nondairy milk
1/4 C lemon juice
1/2 C canola oil
2 Tbsp lemon zest
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 C walnuts, chopped

Preheat the oven to 375. Line a muffin tin with liners.

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Make a well in the center and add milk, lemon juice, oil, zest, and vanilla. Mix just until all wet ingredients are moistened, then fold in the chopped nuts.

Fill each muffin cup three-quarters full and bake for 23 to 27 minutes, until muffins are lightly browned on top.

A quick tip if any of you find zesting tedious, like I do: when a recipe calls for zest, don't just zest the amount you need. Zest the entire fruit (or fruits) and freeze what you don't use. I freeze mine in leftover spice containers, but a small ziploc will do just fine. You can use the extra zest right out of the freezer for later recipes.

Fast, Easy, Homemade Vegan Puff Pastry

Whenever the boyfriend and I feel like deviating from our fairly normal weekend brunch menu of scrambled/fried tofu or tofu benedict, we take out Vegan Brunch and page through it to see what appeals to us that day. I make and remake Isa's seitan sausages often, as well as the whole wheat drop biscuits, and when it's the boyfriend's turn, he makes me the pancakes and waffles.

But there is one thing we have not been able to make. Without fail, every time we open up the cookbook, the boyfriend turns longingly to the Tempeh Sausage Pastry Puffs and asks me if I can make them. "We have to get puff pastry," I always explain.

As it turns out, this is harder than it seems. We shop at a natural food coop that rarely carries puff pastry--and when they do, it has butter. We decided one day to try Whole Foods, who carried, to our initial delight, three kinds of puff pastry! ...but they all had butter in them. Vegan puff pastry is hard to find--especially if you care about what you eat. Vegan Brunch says that Pepperidge Farm's puff pastry is vegan, but guys, do you know what's in Pepperidge Farm's Puff Pastry? Copy and pasted from the nutrition information:

Unbleached Enriched Wheat Flour (Flour, Malted Barley Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate (Vitamin B1), Riboflavin (Vitamin B2), Folic Acid) Water, Partially Hydrogenated Vegetable Shortening (Soybean and Cottonseed Oils Colored with Beta Carotene) 2% or Less of: Gluten, Mono and Diglycerides (from Hydrogenated Soybean Oil), Soy Lecithin.

YUCK. Two kinds of hydrogenated oil. Plus soy and wheat are two things that, if you eat organic, you want to be organic, and because cotton is not a food crop, there are way fewer limitations on the types and amounts of pesticides and herbicides used in dealing with cotton plants. Cottonseed oil is nasty, guys, and if you prefer to eat organic, so is Pepperidge Farm's puff pastry.

I would have to make it myself. But traditional puff pastry requires time, energy, and skill with dough that I do not have. It calls for about 24-36 hours of preparation, most of which is chilling, but a lot of which is rolling out dough. Basically, if you can't master a pie crust (which, embarrassingly, I can't), you're doomed with traditional puff pastry recipes.

BUT THEN I found this recipe. A food processor puff pastry dough that only needs to be rolled out twice and refrigerated once? It was worth a try. I obviously veganized and otherwise changed it slightly, but full credit goes to Cooks Illustrated for it. This is a picture-heavy post because the directions are easier to illustrate than to describe.

Fast, Easy Vegan Puff Pastry

The recipe makes 24 puff pastry squares. You can halve it if you want, but the dough freezes well, so if you only want 12 (like I did), just make the whole recipe and save the rest for later. Also, though the original recipe calls for salt, it also calls for unsalted butter, so I figured earth balance was salt enough.

Ingredients:

2 Cups all-purpose flour (plus a bit for flouring your work surface)

20 Tbsp (that's a cup and a half) vegan margarine, cut into small chunks

6 Tbsp ice water

I normally use the organic Earth Balance, but it's much easier to measure 20 Tbsp with the sticks, which are at least all natural.

1.) Put the flour and about 4 Tbsp of the margarine into a food processor; pulse 15ish times to incorporate. Add the rest of the chunks of butter, then pulse again, but only 3-5 times.

2.) Add the water. Pulse for 10-20 seconds, until it starts to form a ball of dough.

3.) Put the dough on a large sheet of parchment paper, form into a rough rectangle. Put another sheet of parchment paper on top.

4.) With a rolling pin, roll it out long and flat; 12 by 18 inches. Remove the top layer of parchment paper, turn the dough over onto a well-floured surface, then pull off the other layer.

5.) Fold the sides over the middle, so it's now about 4 inches in width.

6.) Roll it up length-wise.

7.) Squash it into a square, then wrap this tightly in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge until firm. The recipe I used says 1 hour, but the longer the dough was in the fridge, the firmer it got, so if you can leave it for a couple hours, even better. (At this point, you can freeze it [or half, like I did] for later use; just put it in a plastic bag in the freezer. Simply thaw by moving it to your fridge then night before you want to use it.)

8.) Take the dough out of the fridge. If you are using the full recipe (for 24 pastries), divide the dough in half and just follow these directions twice, keeping the half you're not using in the fridge until you're ready for it. Again, put the dough between two large sheets of parchment paper. Roll to a 10- by 15-inch rectangle, then cut into 12 pieces.

Here is where the recipe and I differ. I had doubts that these thin little strips would really puff up, so I took each piece, folded it over itself twice (you can see an example of the folded square on the right side of the picture), and rolled it out again not quite as thinly before putting them on the baking sheet.

It took maybe an extra 5 minutes total and I was really glad I did it; they puffed up well, and I know I owe some of the layers to the fact that I did that last-minute extra folding.

I loaded them up with the sausage topping, hoping that after all my work they would really actually puff, and followed Isa's recipe directions (400 degrees for 18-20 minutes)... and voila!

Homemade vegan sausage-topped puff pastries! The are very filling; we each had 3 and a salad for dinner and were stuffed.

I still have the other half of the puff pastry in the fridge. I might make something desserty with it, maybe those palmiers... Any other recommendations for use?

For the record, you could substitute some of the flour with whole wheat pastry flour, but it will puff way less, be less flaky, and take a little more water. I recommend trying it with all white flour the first time at least.

Surprise Sausage Muffins

[Back from summer vacation! And by "vacation" I mean "full-time job." BUT I am back, that’s the important thing.]

You heard me. Sausage. Muffins. Together at last! The “surprise” part comes from the fact that you can’t tell they contain sausage… UNTIL YOU BITE INTO IT:

As you may remember, I love anything that I can make muffin- or cupcake- shaped. However, though you’d never know it from the hundreds of cupcakes and desserts I’ve photographed for this blog, I try not to eat a lot of sugar. This combines the best of both worlds: a muffin, but not sweet! And I’m a sucker for almost anything with cornmeal in it.

This recipe is perfect for a filling on-the-go breakfast (or snack). I am generally not a fan of store-bought meat analogs, but Tofurkey’s beer brats are good and much less time-consuming than making one’s own sausages. Any non-breakfast [ie, crumbly] sausages will do. These muffins are best with gravy or something cheesy (if you’re in a hurry, I have a “Speedy Cheesy Cheater Gravy” recipe below), because they can be a little dry, depending on what kind of sausage you use.

I was inspired by a very non-vegan version of this somewhere on cooks.com, but I changed it a lot AND can’t find the original anymore anyway, so I am not giving you a link. If you have a favorite cornbread/muffin recipe, feel free to use it instead of the batter I give you below, but remember to add the pepper!
Surprise Sausage Muffins

3 Tofurky Beer Brats, each sliced into 4 pieces
(any non-breakfast sausage links will do, though you may need to adjust how many sausages/slices depending on their size. Basically, you want the slices to be around an inch and a half)
1 C non-dairy milk
1 Tbsp vinegar
2 T flax meal
1 C cornmeal
1 C flour (all purpose, or up to half whole wheat pastry flour)
4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
¼ tsp black pepper

Preheat the oven to 350 and grease a muffin pan (or put in muffin cups).

Stir together the milk, vinegar, and flaxmeal in a small bowl or large measuring cup. Stir it really well, then let it sit for at least 5 minutes. In the meantime, combine the cornmeal, flour, baking powder, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Add the oil to the milk mixture (it won’t combine well, but that’s okay), then stir the liquid ingredients in with the dry ones until there are no major lumps.

NOW. Fill the muffin cups ONLY HALF WAY, then put a sausage chunk in each half-filled muffin cup. Like so:
Once you’ve done that, use the rest of the batter to fill the muffin cups completely. Bake 15-20 minutes, until the tops start to turn slightly gold-brown. Let cool slightly before serving. Top, if you want, with vegan margarine or:

Speedy Cheesy Cheater Gravy

I’m almost embarrassed to post this because it’s so simple and silly. However, it tastes like more than the sum of its parts and is ready in five minutes or less. This will generously cover 4 muffins, but as it is so simple it doubles/triples well. It doesn’t keep, though, so eat it all.

up to 1 C water
2 Tbsp yellow (mild) miso
2 Tbsp Earth Balance*
1/8 tsp black pepper

Set the water to boil. While it’s heating up, in a small bowl, mash the miso and Earth Balance/margarine/your fat of choice with a fork until they are really well combined. When the water is boils, remove it from heat and add 1/4 cup of it to the miso/fat mixture. Fork or whisk it until it is a lumpless, thick sauce. Add more water, ONE TABLESPOON AT A TIME, until it is the consistency you desire. Pour on top of Surprise Sausage Muffins or whatever you wanted a Speedy Cheesy Cheater Gravy for in the first place.

*-I recommend this, but you can use other vegan margarine, OR olive oil but if you use oil you will probably end up using less water.

And it would not be a triumphant return if I didn’t post at least SOME cupcakes.
These are from the beginning of the summer, so I forget if they were anything other than just chocolate cupcakes, but they are topped with Sweet and Sara vegan marshmallows, which make me really happy.
I didn’t take a picture of the inside, but these are the orange cream-filled cupcakes from vegan cupcakes take over the world. I brought them in for coworkers within my first couple weeks of work and gained respect as the best baker EVER. Thanks, VCTOtW.

The disadvantage to not blogging over the summer was that I wasn’t at all tempted to write down recipes for things, so when I made up my own recipe for banana cupcakes, I dind’t bother to record it. I LOVED THEM AND I WISH I DID. Some are topped with chocolate, some are topped with a cinnamon icing, and some are both. Though I usually go for chocolate everything, I actually liked the cinnamon-topped ones best.

Next week, I think I should try to stay away from sweets and even muffin-shaped things altogether. Maybe an Indian food post!? I am constantly experimenting in nightshade free Indian cooking.